


Listen to your heart

by Pearlislove



Series: Ben & Polly - one shots [2]
Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (1963)
Genre: Angst and Romance, Angst with a Happy Ending, Bittersweet, F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-20
Updated: 2018-03-20
Packaged: 2019-04-05 04:05:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,333
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14035806
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Pearlislove/pseuds/Pearlislove
Summary: I love youThree little words. Handed out, give and gifts, only to be taken back, sometimes all too easily.What does it take, for the love to hold?Or, the love story of Ben and Polly.





	Listen to your heart

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Abboz](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Abboz/gifts).



> For the Lovely Abboz, who got me discussing Ben & Polly and whether or not they were endgame, as well as hoe the road to end game would look. 
> 
> One thing we discussed was the fact that some stories show them having a lot of bumps in the road, and even walkign their seperate ways for a while(in some canons forever), which is what this fanfic was inspiered by.

_Polly, what are you talking about? It’s crazy! You can’t say things like this!_

 

_No, don’t you see? We’re just doing it because we think we have to! Because... because we think that we can’t find someone else, when no one else has seen all the things that we have, and, and... it’s just wrong!_

 

_Polly, please stop! You’re scaring me_

 

_No! Enough is enough! We can’t do this, Ben, we can’t just…_

  


“Mum? Can I have a cookie? Polly want one too!”

 

Polly comes reeling back to the real world as her soon tugs at her skirt, and she smile. “As soon as i’m done with this paragraph, sweetie. Mum got a deadline.” She gestured to the typewriter on the table, and watched as her five year old son nodded. “Polly isn’t getting one, though. She’s too little.”

 

“But I want sister to have one too!” Ben frowned, and Polly’s heart broke in two as she watched him, seeing how very much he looked like his father.

 

The golden wedding ring with the expensive stones weighed down Polly’s left ring finger, and she couldn't help how different it was from the thin silver band Ben had once bought her, to his duchess, as a demonstration of his undying love.

 

If only Polly’s love had managed to stretch as far as his.

 

“Why don’t you let me have one? Then when I feed her I’ll pass the cookie on to her?” Polly suggested kindly, hoping to win over her son.

 

“If you won’t give her cookies, I will find them myself!” Her son shouted in responds, promptly running off on long legs. Just like his father little Ben was quick to become angry when unsatisfied, and Polly had just offended him in the worst of ways.

 

Sighing, Polly finally left the table, heading out into the kitchen to make sure her son didn’t tear down the kitchen in rage. Soon enough  her Daughter would wake and demand feeding, and Polly didn’t feel particularly thrilled at the possibility of having to clean up destroyed china and wraggle a fuming five year old simultaneously.

 

“Hey, Ben?”

 

“hmm? Yes?” Ben looked up from his dinner, staring at his girlfriends smiling face. “Did you want something?”

 

Ellie sigh. “No, not really. I just wanted to tell you about this new boy I’m caring for.”

 

“Oh? Well, go ahead. I didn’t know you’d gotten a new one. How many do you care for now, ten?” Temporarily abandoning his food, Ben leaned in, showing his girlfriend that he was listening.

 

“Nine. Almost right.” Ellie smiled. “But no, I got this boy, Ben. His mum’s a part time fashion reviewer and work from home, mostly, but she’s just had a baby so her husband decided she needed some stress relief. The got me watching after hm two days a week, currently. Funny thing is…” She paused, looking Ben over as though searching for something in his appearance. “He really reminds me of you. He got basically the same appearance, avts a lot like you, and you even share the same name as him. It’s almost scary” She laughed. “Never had an illegitimate child by any chance?” She smiled a silly grin, and Ben looked away, trying his very best to hide the tears suddenly threatening in his eyes.

 

_I hate you! I hate you, I hate you, I hate you! To think I even wanted to have your children!_

 

_Polly please…_

 

_Don’t! Don’t ‘Polly’ me, Ben Jackson! You can’t make me stay!_

 

“Ben? Hey, Ben, is everything okay?” Concerned, Ellie reached out to touch her boyfriend, and despite her best attempt at being gentle he startled violently.

 

“Ah!” Violently jumping back into the real world, Ben looked around himself, slowly starting to calm down again as he remembered where he was. He shook his head. “Sorry, Ellie, I’m fine. Just a lot on my mind.” He smiled weakly, and Ellie nodded scaptically, her frown showing how she did not truly believe him.

 

Ben sigh. He never could, nor did he want to, tell her about Polly. He knew she wouldn’t understand, not when half the story was too unbelievable to be told. Even after so many years, Ben wanted nothing more than to try and forget all that had happened to them.

 

It was easier that way, he told himself. On some days he could almost believe it, too.

 

* * *

 

 

Polly smiled. Today was a good day, she decided, angling her head up towards the warm summer sun. She’d gotten away from the modeling job she had booked early, and after relieving the babysitter and carefully tucking her baby in among the blankets in the stroller, she headed out to pick up her son.

 

James had been a complaining a lot lately, telling Polly that she should spend more time at home with the kids, and she felt happy to be able to rub in his face that she’d picked up Ben all of two hours early from the babysitter that day.

 

Reaching the familiar yellow door, she parked the stroller and unpacked her baby, lifting the sleeping 7 month old into her arms instead as she went for the door handle.

 

Inside, she could hear two voices speaking. One was the familiar voice of the babysitter, a wwoman named Ellir that Polly liked quite a lot. The other one was a deep male voice that suddenly seemed all too familiar to Polly.

 

She paused, hand on the handle. The voice was familiar, yet she couldn’t quite place it. In her mind, Polly could hear someone calling for her.

 

_Duchess!_

 

She could hear the soft, whispering voice inside her, rising from deep down in her memories, and it gave her such a bad feeling. It was just something inside her, a defense mechanism that switched on, telling her not to go inside. Warning her, that she shouldn’t be near that voice.

 

Nonetheless, Polly took a stabilizing breath and tightened the grip around her baby. In one swift moment, she pressed down and opened the door, letting it swing open as she stepped inside.

 

* * *

 

 

Behind Ben, the door to the house opened, and as he turned around, he could feel his breath being stolen from him.

 

Standing there, blonde hair and daffodil yellow dress fluttering in the soft breeze from outside, was Polly Wright. So many years had passed and so much had changed since they last saw each other, and yet, Ben recognised his former partner immediately.

 

He opens his mouth, but don’t have any words, standing around and looking like a fish on dry land as he tried to form a coherent sentence for his mouth to pronounce.

 

Before he has the time to come that far, though, Ben hears someone else calling out from behind.

 

“Mum!” One of Ellie’s children, a boy not more than six or seven years old, barrel past him, aiming for Polly and soon clinging on to her legs. “I missed you mum!”

 

Polly smile, one hand reaching out to pet his scruffy blonde mop of hair. The other arm is clinging to a tiny baby, and on her left finger a wedding ring - expensive golden, so much unlike the one he once bought her - glitter, and he realize, that he has moved.

 

He is just about to turn in his feet and march off to the kitchen, when he catch Polly’s reply.

 

“Just be good, Ben, and I might give you some cake when we get home.” Polly’s voice is sweet and melodious, but it is not that, which makes Ben turn around again.

 

It is the name. The fact, that he remembers Ellie describing the boy she cared for that was so much like him, and realizing he is Polly’s son.

 

Ben turns around, looking at the six year old boy now holding his mothers hand. From the blonde hair to the dark eyes, Ben truly sees himself in the boy. Slowly, surely, a realisation seems to awake in his head.

 

Six years had passed since Polly walked out on him. Six years ago, she fled from their home and never returned, because Ben wasn’t enough.

 

The little boy that so faithfully clinged on to her and, by his own girlfriend's admittance, acted very much like him, was about six years old, and Ben knew, he knew that when she left there had been no baby boy.

 

Ben could feel deep, deep down in his heart, that six years ago, something had gone incredibly wrong.

 

* * *

 

 

“Wait!”

 

As Polly leaves the house, her son in one hand and the baby final back asleep on the other arm, she hears someone calling for her from behind.

 

Spinning around, pushing her boy in behind her legs in some sort of defensive instinct, she turns to face the man who’d called for her.

 

As she turns around, she comes face to face with Ben Jackson. From the navy jacke to the hair to the dark eyes and bright smile, he is still the same as the night she left. He is still as beautofulnas he had once been and it breaks Polly’s heart to watch him standing there.

 

“Polly, wait! Please.” He begs, and Polly cry, tears falling down her cheeks faster than she can sweep them away.

 

“Ben. Ben just...please go. I don't have anything you want” She scream, more tears falling and rapidly replacing the old ones as she hurried to try and pack into the stoller. It whined and cried over the sudden manhandling, but she couldn’t care less.

 

“Mum. Mum I’m scared!” Baby Ben pulled at Polly’s skirt and she schhed him.

 

“Not now, baby.” She said, using one hand to pull him in behind her, out of Ben’s line of vision.

 

“You say you don’t have anything I want. But what about my son? What about _our baby_ , Polly?” Ben tries to keep calm, but it’s so hard. He sees the tears flowing down her cheeks and hear the cries of her baby as she hurried to push her back down into the stroller. It hurts, that after so long she still feel so stuck whenever he is near her. “How could just never tell em you were pregnant? Did you really, really think it was better to run away?!”

 

He screams, loud and hard and hoping his girlfriend won’t hear it, and he hates himself for it but it has effect. Polly freeze, her arms down in the stroller with the baby and the tiny boy poking his head around his mum’s legs.

 

“I have two hours. James will be expecting me to be back home in two hours.” Slowly, Polly lift her head, glancing up at Ben. “Want to go to a cafe?”

 

Ben nodded. Two hours. It’s not much, but he is willing to take it. “Take the stroller and the baby, I’ll take the boy.” He says, walking over the terrified little boy and offering his hand. “Want to hold my hand, little buddy?”

 

The boy looks at him with big frightened eyes, and Ben figure that he’d looked at The Doctor like that a few times.

 

“Mommy can I?” Ben looks up at Polly, and when she finally nodded, he take Bens hand. “Yay!” The delighted squeak surprise Ben, but it also warmed his heart to hear. Perhaps, this could be the start to a new life, a new life where he had a son.

 

“Lead the way Polly.” Ben gesture in front of him, letting Polly take the stroller and head  on down the path from the house.

 

* * *

 

 

“I promise you, I didn’t...I didn’t know about Ben when I left you.” Upset, Polly stabbed at her cake slice with the spoon. The day that had once started out so good was now going down the drain as she explained to her ex why she never informed him he made her pregnant.

 

 _I wouldn't have left if I’d known_  are words that float between them, halfway out of Polly’s mouth already but not actually making into the open. It was sour, and she feared that if she did say it, it would tarnish the love they had used to had. Cheapen it, claiming it was superficial enough that a baby would have made a difference.

 

“Does your husband know he is not a father?” Ben asks it bluntly knows it is no point in denying the truth as he help make sure his son doesn’t spill all his juice.

 

“Yes” Polly replies, grateful to have Ben helping her as the juice she bought for her oldest almost go flying to the floor. “We were dating, at the time, but hadn’t been intimate yet. There was no use hiding it from him, so I told James it was my ex's baby.”

 

“And he just accepted it?” Ben looked at Polly, surprised. Even if 1970s was kinder than the 1960s had been, illegitimate children were not appreciated.

 

“He wanted a life with me. I’m a pretty girl, boys do want me!” Taking a deep breath to call down, Polly bent down to fuss with her daughters blankets. “He said if I promised to say yes when he proposed, he’d tell everyone it was his baby. He’s a handsome man, I liked him, so I took it.”

 

“And you didn’t think I’d ever find out, did you? Just went and named him after me instead?” Ben asked. He could see how the child was looking at them, his head moving back and forth between his parents as he chewed on his slice of cake. For his sake Ben tried to keep his voice down.

 

“What was I to do? Even if I wanted to I couldn’t just come running back. I couldn’t cheapen out love by thinking a baby would be enough to fix it!” Finally, Polly lifts the baby out of the stroller, holding it to her chest and rocking it gently. “Life doesn’t work like that, Ben. “

 

Silently, Ben watched Polly with the baby. The golden wedding band on her finger glittered in the sunlight, and he almost felt as though there was a force field surrounding Polly. A barrier, keeping him out of her life and mind when he wanted nothing more than to be in it all.

 

Shaking his head softly, Ben decided that it was best to ask about something else. “What’s the girls name?” He says softly, nodding his head at the baby still whimpering in Polly’s arms.

 

“Polly. She’s seven months, if you wonder. Completely unplanned.” Smiling lovingly, Polly stroked the round little apple cheek of the baby, fingers moving up her head to the little tuft of blonde hair.

 

“So you got Ben and Polly junior, now?” Ben shook his head, almost disbelieving. Inside him, his heart beat mike crazy, pumping out blood and hormones and feeling sinto every part of his body.

 

The feeling, that he didn’t want Polly to go, spreading through him like a wildfire about to consume his entire being. After so many years of denying it, Ben is finally admitting what he truly feels. He is finally letting himself realize, that he still love Polly.

 

* * *

 

 

Polly observes Ben shyly. Though she would have thought he’d have changed more over the last six years, it is somehow a relief to find him still the same. Still her Ben, the Ben she had used to know.

 

Polly wonders, if he's thinking the same. If when he looks at her, he still sees the girl he fell in love with on their travels through time and space.

 

She doesn’t know. All she knows, is that she doesn't see that girl. The first few days after she left Ben had been full of bliss, a new sense of freedom and happiness that she didn’t think she could ever feel with Ben.

 

Now, she wasn’t so sure. The more time passed, the more lost Polly felt lost. She felt as though she had tried to save herself from something she thought was destroying her, and ended up with the exact opposite instead.

 

“Polly, do you…” Ben began, then stopped. He sigh, dragging his fingers through his hair and making it to stick in every direction. “I’m sorry. I know you’re married, and happily so. I mean, you even have a baby! I just…” Ben continue to ramble, and Polly can feel a pressure building up inside her for every word he said, making her feel more and more under pressure until finally, she couldn’t keep quiet anymore.

 

“Yes!” She screams, so loud that other patrons in the Cafe turn to look at her. She blush, definitely stares right down at the little baby sleeping in her arms. Takes a deep breath, lower her voice, continue. “I feel lost Ben. I feel broken and smashed to pieces and I don’t... I don’t know how to heal. I miss you, Ben. I look at our son every day and I see you and I wish that I was sitting on that ratty old couch we never threw out with you again.” Carefully, she lifts her eyes, let them meet Ben’s dark orbs. There full of pain and surprise and she waits, waits for him to reject her and call her crazy.

_You can’t just turn everything on it’s head because you feel like it! You need to commit, Polly!_

  


“But...what about James?” Ben asks, his confusion transforming into absolute horror and that look, that _look_ makes Polly so sick she almost want to throw up.

 

She holds her baby tightly to her chest, feel the warmth of the tiny mass inside the blankets, whimpering quietly and silently, trying to gain comfort from the small child. “Do you want me back, Ben? Or are...are you happier without me?” She looks Ben in his eyes and she pray, she praise that he will say what she want to hear.

 

“No.” Ben shakes his head, make a split second decision without even thinking about Ellie and how she thinks she still got a boyfriend. “I want you, Polly. I never _stopped_ wanting you! I just tried to move on.” He reaches out, putting a steady hand on her arm still wrapped around the child. He looks at Polly, offering her a weak smile, and sees her smiling weakly back.

 

Carefully, Polly put away the baby in the stroller again, before lifting her hands back up on the table and grabbing on to Ben’s hand still resting there. “I love you” She whispers, tries out the words in an attempt to discern if it truly feels like a good thing to do. It does. The words leave her lips easier than the same words have towards James in a very long time, and so, she smile her sunniest smile.

 

The golden ring on her left ring finger glitter in the sunlight, and Polly immediately pulls it off. Quickly, efficiently, she disposed of it on the table. Letting it lie to the side as their fingers intertwined and they hold onto each other tight.

 

Ben, too, smile. The wedding ring has been put to the side and the forefield is gone, allowing Ben to enter into Polly’s sphere, into her heart and soul. It feels right, and Ben loves it. “I love you too” Ben whispers back, quietly but surely. He is convinced, that this is the start of something new, something better and lovelier than what they had before.

 

“Mum, can I have more juice?” Shaking his cup, Ben tried to catch the attention of the two grownups. He had been waiting patiently while they spoke, but now, his patience would take him no longer.

 

Polly and Ben glanced at their son, then each other, before looking back to their son. They laughed, huge grins on their faces as they realised it was all going to be okay. Not easy, and certainly not fun in the beginning, but eventually, it was going to be _okay_.

 

 _Okay_ was all Polly and Ben ever wished for.

 

**Author's Note:**

> A comment is worth a thousand kudos. Please leave one?


End file.
